Agriculture

"Earth has lost enough soil moisture in the last 40 years to change the planet’s spin and shift the location of the North Pole, according to a new study published today in Science that tracks how human activities have disrupted the global water cycle. The persistent loss of water from land to oceans has dried out huge portions of every continent and may be irreversible, scientists describing the new research said this week."

"When Leslie Stewart moved to her home in a rural expanse of Lincoln County outside of Oklahoma City more than 20 years ago, she thought she’d found a slice of heaven. ... But several years ago, her neighbor began applying sewage sludge, which consists largely of human waste left over from municipal wastewater treatment facilities, as a fertilizer on his farmland, causing a rancid smell so powerful it nearly took her breath away."

"After decades of pressure from farmworkers and their allies, California launched a statewide system to warn communities before they’re exposed to toxic pesticides. But health concerns remain."

"The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, although battered by Trump administration attempts to impose massive staff and budget cuts on the agency, nevertheless continues to publish critical climate information, including some dire drought warnings in the spring outlook published March 20 by NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center."

"Growing weed inside uses about 1 percent of U.S. energy and pollutes more than cryptocurrency mining. There’s a better way to fuel America’s high."

"A jury in Georgia has ordered Monsanto parent Bayer to pay nearly $2.1 billion in damages to a man who says the company’s Roundup weed killer caused his cancer, according to attorneys representing the plaintiff."

"Retreating glaciers threaten the food and water supply of 2 billion people around the world, the UN has warned, as current “unprecedented” rates of melting will have unpredictable consequences."

"A consortium of Black farmers in the north-east take financial hits as harsh USDA cuts threaten their operations"

"Every Friday, as he’s done for the last year and a half, Mark Broyles hops in his truck and drives 20 minutes from his home in Big Stone Gap to Duffield, Virginia, to pick up two boxes of free food. Though their contents are always a surprise, as the retired mechanic describes it, he’s able to get “fresh produce and stuff that a lot of us can’t afford because of the price of groceries.”"